The best strategy for longevity in filmmaking is to obtain both a solid film education AND a wealth of experiences in today’s multi-media. To learn the “mother tongue” of the FEATURE FILM NARRATIVE is to facilitate success in the other vocabularies of advertising, documentaries, music videos, corporate videos, educational videos, and television productions.

Every filmmaker should aspire to be exhibited in as many venues as possible, from cinemaplexes like the SM Theaters, to the YOUTUBE.

Big screens, though, continue to project a special, magical appeal, the reason it’s worth learning film craftsmanship through a comprehensive program of academic discipline and practical skills-training.”

In the first week of Januray in the New Year 2007, I am happy to announce the opening of the MARILOU DIAZ-ABAYA FILM INSTITUTE AND ARTS CENTER!

With campuses in Horseshoe Village and the Providence Building in Greenhills, Quezon City, and our Antipolo Center in the Philippines now under construction and inaugurating in June, the MDAFI is now open for applications to our Basic Course in the Motion Picture Language, Advanced Course in Motion Picture Production, Junior Video Summer Program, and Film Scoring 1 Summer Workshop.

Consistent with our advocacy for quality film education, and, in particular, from an Asian perspective, the new Institute is established to empower new filmmakers to meet the demands of new times. That cinema is better learned and taught in the greater context of the arts and humanities is the concept upon which we anchor our core curriculum. Thus, we offer a well-rounded program to obtain for our students a deeper understanding of the dynamic rapport between cinema and life.

The science, art, and business of filmmaking constitute our three-point agenda of learning, with the end in view for our students to make Asian films for the world. We are primarily a school for future WRITER-PRODUCER-DIRECTORS who will devote two years to academic and field training in film production, and who, in the process, will hopefully develop their own community of filmmakers with whom they can share lasting careers in motion pictures.

In these exciting times of “multi-technologies” when visual storytellers and their entertainment audiences enjoy nearly limitless options to making and viewing significant human experiences, a much higher level of excellence in motion pictures is demanded by a more discriminating public, especially a paying public. For this reason, filmmakers are challenged to be better educated, better skilled, and better prepared for the variety of ways by which they can be appreciated.

I am privileged to mentor my next batch of students in collaboration with my co-faculty members who are, as I am, passionate about teaching as a vocation. Our individual and collective resumes reflect our academic and professional credentials. In addition to our regular instructors and drill masters, eminent guest lecturers and mentors provide specialized courses in art history, social communications, computer generated effects, laboratory procedures, finance management, marketing and promotions.

I believe that film education has more to do with WHO teach and learn, rather than what equipment they use. New technologies will come and go, but human talent and experiences shared and received systematically and with much feeling, are the best instruments of learning.

Learn from both masters and rookies. Invest two years in intensive training at MDAFI, then spend a lifetime working in borderless film sets!